What am I?

Tuesday, 18 December 2018

Something hard to maintain in my working life as a learning technologist is the thing called 'balance'. On a daily basis, there seems to be too much technology and not enough learning. When software developers work hard on improving their products, it's often to the detriment of the usability of the very same products. Even in cases where a closer look might indeed reveal that a certain bit of functionality has 'enhanced' the product, this comes at a cost for the general user (me?). One factor in the game is certainly: humans are creatures of habit. Let's look at the small things, for example, the position of a button. I might have used a particular button in 'autopilot' mode for years. When the position of this very button is changed, it leaves me in ... what? Correct. Great frustration. It gets worse (a lot!) when the functionality within the software changes, and I can no longer do things in the same way I got used to doing them. Trivial? Yes, it is. And at the same time, it's also quite important, because it can mean that 'getting to grips with using a particular technology' can obscure the purpose of why I'm using it in the first place.